We'll Make It Work
by zippystripe
Summary: It's 2014 and Terry is dead. Mickey decides it's time for a new start; Ian knows exactly how to get there.
1. Chapter 1

It began on the day of Terry's funeral.

Ian had come to the wake to comfort Mandy; the actual service itself at the crematorium had seemed a little too daunting for Ian to show up. Plus, something told him he wouldn't have been exactly welcomed with open arms by a certain Milkovich. Really, he wouldn't be welcomed to the wake, either, but he'd come anyway.

Mandy was still inside; she'd been huddled in a quiet corner with Lip, her chair pulled closer to his and her head rested on his shoulder forlornly while he stroked her back comfortingly. She'd occasionally stood up to talk to the odd relative or friend while most of her brothers worked on getting hammered at the bar.

When Ian had arrived, he'd spoken to her for a while and wiped at her slightly smeared mascara affectionately, before he'd glanced around in search of Mickey.

"He's outside having a smoke, I think." Mandy said with a gloomy smirk, reading his mind. Ian glanced over at Lip, who was checking his phone absently, and then stood up, smiling and nodding at the dark haired girl before he made his way to the heavy double doors of the fire exit.

As he stepped outside, he looked out over the metal railings until he spotted Mickey standing on the other side of the parking lot, alone, leaning against another building with a trail of smoke drifting up from him. Ian paced over to him, zipping his dark hoodie up in the now slightly bitter cold and shoving his hands into his pockets stiffly.

Mickey glanced over at him and then looked away slightly disdainfully, licked his dry, chapped lower lip and took a deep drag on his cigarette.

"What are you doing here?" He croaked quietly. It didn't come out quite as aggressively as he'd hoped.

Ian moved to lean against the wall on the other side of him and folded his arms over his chest. "Just wanted to make sure you were okay." Ian replied.

Mickey eyed him slightly suspiciously and flicked ash on the ground. His eyes seemed to mist over for a moment, and then he looked away. "M'fine." He mumbled, his voice still slightly rough.

Ian was quiet for a moment and studied the other boy's profile. "I know that we're… you know, whatever," he began awkwardly, looking away from Mickey when he turned to eye him curiously, "but I know you probably need a friend right now." Ian added, not really sure what to say. He resisted the urge to rub his face in frustration. "I don't know… it's just, there's probably not many people you can open up to, and, I know things are weird between us, but I'm here if you need anything. Still." He shifted his weight from one foot to the other and stared at the ground.

Mickey sighed out a puff of smoke and fiddled with the butt of the cigarette between his fingers. His breaths sounded a little laboured, like he was on the brink of crying and it was taking all his energy to hold the tears back. "Thanks." He rasped, to Ian's surprise.

Emboldened, Ian continued. "I'm not going to judge you if you cry, Mick." He said, his voice barely above a whisper, but more relaxed now.

Mickey let out a bitter, breathless laugh, but there was something exhausted about his demeanour, Ian noted. Mickey dropped his cigarette butt on the ground and leaned his head against the brick wall behind him with a sigh, crossing his arms over his chest. "The last thing he said to me before he left was 'go fuck yourself'." He said heavily after a moment.

Ian was silent. It wasn't really a surprise. They'd never had a particularly good relationship.

"I asked him if he could score me a few bags of coke from the heist so I could deal it."

Ian glanced up at him.

"Fucker." Mickey grunted after a moment of staring into the distance.

Ian didn't really know what to say. It was no secret between them that Mickey and his father didn't have the best of relationships. Hell, he'd been there and witnessed the abuse that he knew had probably been the story of Mickey's life himself. It wasn't a surprise. He didn't know why he or Mandy or their brothers were so upset really, after all the things he'd done to them, but he remembered at that moment the way they'd felt when they'd thought Frank was dead. It was probably just a lot for them to take in.

They stood in silence a while longer, until Ian stood up straight and spoke. "You wanna get out of here?" He asked.

Mickey looked at him inquisitively. "And go where?"

"I don't know. A bar, maybe. I don't think anyone's gonna miss you in there."

"Which bar?" The older boy asked suspiciously.

"Just a bar, Mick. No go-go boys, I promise."

Mickey smirked. "Fine. Lead the way."

They ended up in a quiet, darkened bar at the end of a dead-end street. It was dimly lit apart from the wall fixtures dotted along the narrow room opposite the bar, and the two of them found a dark corner near the back to sit and talk.

Ian smirked as he placed two beers down on the small, grubby table as Mickey glared daggers and swore at a burly man who seemed to be sizing the two of them up. "Calm down." Ian whispered, and slid the beer towards him across the time.

Mickey sighed and shuffled in his seat before he rummaged around the inside pocket of his blazer and pulled out a pack of cigarettes. Ian watched him light up and take a deep, uncomfortable drag on it, searching his face sympathetically.

"So why'd you bring me here anyway?" The older boy asked quietly, puffing out a trail of smoke.

"Just thought you might want to get away. And have some company."

"I don't need company."

"I didn't say 'need'. I said 'want'." Ian replied.

Mickey looked like he was about to say something else, but he just twisted and bit his lip before taking another drag on the cigarette.

"I heard about the baby." Ian said, and after a moment, he added, uncertainly, "I'm sorry."

"I'm not." Mickey replied quickly.

Ian blinked in surprise.

"Dodged a fuckin' bullet there, let me tell you." Mickey licked over his smoke-dried lower lip and looked down in a way which told Ian that perhaps that wasn't the whole truth. "'Fuckin' thing probably wasn't even mine in the first place." He mumbled, and began to fiddle with the battered coaster his beer was resting on.

Ian furrowed his brow, and tried to ignore how much the whole situation had stung him, for Mickey's sake.

"You know, I actually worked it out. It couldn't have been mine. It was born like six or… seven months after we got married. And apparently it was full-term or some shit, even though it was dead." Mickey explained, grabbing his beer and taking a deep swig from the bottle.

Ian nodded along with what Mickey was saying. Svetlana's continued drinking throughout her pregnancy had apparently taken it's toll.

"Anyways…" Mickey began quietly. "I could've done with you around." He glanced at Ian tentatively, as though he was afraid to make eye contact.

Ian pursed his lips anxiously. He wasn't going to apologise. "I know." He said simply.

Mickey didn't look expectant, though. Instead, he returned to downing the rest of his beer.

A few drinks later, and Mickey was getting a little rowdy. Something told Ian that he'd started getting drunk at the wake and had decided to leave once his brothers had hit the bar. He could imagine him not wanting to listen to everybody else's woes about his father while he was struggling to deal with his own. He decided it was time to leave when Mickey started shouting and swearing about certain memories Ian knew a sober Mickey would not want half of Chicago knowing, and so he grabbed Mickey around the shoulders and started to drag him, flailing and unsteady, out of the bar and into the bitter cold of night.

They ended up staggering home under the L, and the walk seemed to help sober the dark haired boy up a little. Mickey pulled away from where he'd slung an arm over Ian's shoulder and wobbled over to a cable box that was attached to a tangle of wires leading up a pillar. He stumbled around for a moment before he lifted himself on top of it and felt around his pocket for a joint. Ian walked up to him and planted himself down next to him, but tried not to let their legs brush like he usually would have done.

"So how was juvie, anyway?" Mickey mumbled around the joint in his mouth, followed by the crackle and spark of his lighter. "Were you as much of a pussy as I thought you'd be?"

Ian laughed. "Nah, I learnt from the master."

"Ha." Mickey smirked, taking a deep drag on the joint with a quiet moan that shot inappropriately right to Ian's crotch. "Did you fuck anyone?" He asked.

"Couple of guys." Ian answered. "Not gonna be anyone's bitch, am I?"

Mickey let out a short laugh and passed the joint to Ian absently. Taking it, Ian took a long drag on it and licked his lips at the vague taste of Mickey's mouth that lingered on the filter. It had been such a long time since they'd kissed, and Ian longed for the feeling again. But he stuck to his resolve as he had done for the last few months since he'd been released from juvie, and didn't give into it. He didn't want to go there again.

Mickey sighed and closed his eyes, leaning his head back against the concrete pillar behind them. "I wish he'd taken me on that heist." He said after a moment.

Ian furrowed his brow. "Mickey, like seven people got shot and two of them died. You got a deathwish or something?" Ian asked, handing the joint back to him.

Mickey was silent, and stared up at the cracks in the L bridge above them. His eyes seemed to be shining a little as he brought the joint up to his lips.

_'Oh_.' Ian thought, a little stunned.

Mickey rubbed at his eyes and glanced at Ian with a bitter grin, like he hadn't just basically said that he wished he was dead.

"Well," Ian began, his eyes softening a little, "_I'm _glad you didn't go."

Mickey scoffed. "Nice of you to say. Didn't think you'd be too concerned."

"What?" Ian said, furrowing his brow in confusion.

"I thought you made yourself pretty clear when you fucking enlisted and decided to fuck off for four years." He spat.

"Clear of what?" Ian asked, a little annoyed.

Mickey licked his lips and took another drag. "Doesn't matter."

"Of what, Mickey?"

Mickey sighed and ran his tongue over his teeth in annoyance. "You know what." He mumbled.

"No, I really don't."

"It doesn't fucking matter, alright?" Mickey sighed, exasperated. "The fact you don't even know what I'm talking about basically answers my question anyway."

Ian frowned in confusion and then shook his head. "God, you fuck with my head so fucking much sometimes."

"I could say the same thing about you, shithead." Mickey replied, flicking ash on the damp ground.

They sat in silence for a few moments while Ian stewed over Mickey's words in his head.

"It's not like I wanted to leave." Ian said quietly after a moment. "But you've known that I was going to leave eventually for years."

Mickey sighed.

"If you'd just… If you hadn't married her, then I wouldn't have left." Ian explained.

Mickey shook his head in annoyance and gave a bitter laugh. "You're a fucking asshole, you know that?"

"_I'm_ the asshole?"

"Either that or you're fucking mentally deficient or some shit. No wonder you didn't get into West Point."

"Fuck you!" Ian spat.

"You were there yourself!" Mickey shouted back.

Ian was suddenly quiet, his seething expression softening a little bit.

"You saw what my dad did to us. We're lucky we're not dead!" Mickey yelled.

Ian jumped off the cable box and started to walk away, but Mickey followed him. "Ian!" He called.

Ian kept walking, but eventually the older man caught up to him, grabbing him by the shoulder and whirling him around. "Do you not get that?" Mickey yelled, his eyes searching Ian's desperately. "_I - had - no - choice!_" He said loudly.

Blinking away a tear, Ian pulled away. "We could've-"

"What?" Mickey barked. "What do you think we could've done, Ian?"

Ian was silent, but a tear rolled down his face. "It's not about that." He said quietly after a moment, his voice barely above a whisper.

Mickey stared at him expectantly.

"It's not about that. It's because you wouldn't even try." Ian murmured. "You wouldn't even try and stand up to him. You just let him ruin your life. And then you even fucking stood up for him!" Ian laughed bitterly. "You stood there and defended the guy who ruined your life, who ruined Mandy's life, who ruined _my life_."

Mickey swallowed.

"Do you not see how _fucked up _that is?!"

"Maybe to you it is-"

"Oh jesus fucking christ, Mick, it'd be fucked up to _anyone_ with half a fucking brain cell."

Mickey shook his head and took a drag on the nearly spent joint between his fingers.

Ian was silent for a few moments, before he began speaking again, quieter this time. "I couldn't… I couldn't sit there and watch the two of you play happy families like Kash and Linda. I couldn't, Mick."

Mickey blinked and looked a little surprised.

"I couldn't… I didn't want that for you." He said. "It drove Kash crazy, it fucked Ned's life up, and it's going to fuck yours up if you _don't get out of there_."

"I think it's already done that." Mickey replied, glancing at Ian.

"But it doesn't have to anymore, Mick." Ian said softly, reaching forward to grasp the shorter boy gently by the shoulders. "He's dead. He can't hurt you anymore."

Mickey stared at the floor, his eyes welling up a little. He yearned to reach out and put his arms around the other man, but he couldn't. It was like he was rooted to the spot, and he could only listen.

"He's gone." Ian murmured.

Sucking in a deep breath, Mickey looked up at the redhead with wetter eyes than he would've liked.

"But he's my _dad."_ He croaked after a minute, as a tear finally rolled down his face.

Ian looked at him sympathetically. "I know." He replied, his voice breaking a little.

Mickey panted a little from the strain of trying to keep the tears in, but when Ian's hand reached up and brushed one away with his thumb, they started to roll down his cheeks even more.

"Come here." Ian said softly, and slid his hand to cup the back of Mickey's head before gently pulling him against his chest.

He half expected the older man to pull away and swear at him for _'acting all faggy'_, but he didn't. Instead, he tentatively leaned towards him and rested his forehead on Ian's shoulder. Slowly, Ian placed an arm around the brunet's waist and pressed a splayed hand to his lower back, while his other hand stroked the back of Mickey's head.

Mickey dropped the spent joint in his hand and brought his arm up to fist a hand in the back of Ian's hoodie tightly while he began to sob, his shoulders shaking silently as hid his screwed-up face in Ian's shoulder. Ian pressed his face to the side of Mickey's head and rubbed comforting circles on his lower back.

"It's okay." Ian whispered, stroking the short spikes of hair on the back of Mickey's hair and scratching over them slowly.

Overhead, the L train screeched towards them, quietly at first and then piercingly loud, drowning out the sound of Mickey's sobs for a few seconds. The light flashed over them repeatedly until the violent convulsions of the train died down and they were left with only the lingering, pungent scent of gasoline and steel. With it, Mickey's shudders calmed, but he didn't move. For the first time since his mother had been alive, Mickey felt protected. The feeling of safety found from his mother was suddenly thrown violently into focus in such a way that it couldn't have been unless it had been lost. Without it, the world seemed far bigger and scarier than it had been before; but Mickey, having had to virtually fend for himself since childhood, had trained himself to see how unneeded it was. Until this moment, he had remained convinced. At this moment, Mickey felt cocooned; safer than he'd ever been, and he wasn't ready to let go of that yet.

After another minute, they pulled away from each other, but remained close. Ian reached a sleeve-covered hand up and wiped away the last of Mickey's tears. His hand, however, slid out from beneath his sleeve and cupped Mickey's chin between his thumb and forefinger. He lifted his thumb and stroked the older boy's lower lip, looking at his mouth with hooded eyes.

Glancing up at him, Mickey stuck his tongue out momentarily to brush Ian's thumb, and closing his eyes, the redhead leaned down and planted a kiss on Mickey's mouth. They kissed slowly for a few minutes, opening their mouths and drinking each other in.

It was odd. Mickey hadn't thought that being kissed would feel different to being the kisser. But no, Ian kissing him was _way_ different. It felt like being claimed, for one thing; something Mickey didn't exactly like unless it was in a purely sexual context. But this felt different. It felt tender, meaningful and full of years worth of repressed emotion. It felt weird to Mickey to let Ian do it; but he couldn't deny that it felt right. Plus, he wasn't about to push Ian off after they'd been apart for so long.

After a few minutes, Ian pulled away, but his eyes were still closed as he pressed their foreheads together. "I missed you." He whispered quietly, not daring to look the brunet in the eye.

Mickey gripped the back of his head to keep him close. "Yeah, me too." It was quiet for a while after that; the two of them stood there in the darkness beneath the L. Mickey broke the silence after a minute. "I want…" He began. "I want to… you know. I want to be with you. Properly." He murmured, staring down at the ground beneath them and refusing to meet Ian's gaze.

Opening his eyes, Ian looked down at the older man. "I want to be with you too." He said. "But… I mean it this time Mick. It's got to be more even. I can't do everything on your terms all the time."

"I know." Mickey said after a moment, still looking at the ground.

"You promise?"

"Yes!"

"Good." Ian whispered with a smile, laughing a little as Mickey tried to hide his own. "We'll make it work." He said after a moment, stroking the older man's face.

"You promise?" Mickey asked quietly.

"Promise." Ian replied with a smile, and leaned forward to kiss him again.


	2. Chapter 2

It took less than a week after the funeral for Svetlana to disappear.

Mickey had been out collecting payment for some meth he'd dealt a couple of weeks earlier and had returned to find the bed made, the closets and drawers empty of the trampy clothes that he'd become accustomed to seeing and the girly decorations gone. He wished he could say that he was at least a little bit disappointed, but it just wasn't there.

In fact, Mickey had suspected something for quite a while now. He'd never paid a huge amount of attention to his wife's schedule, but he'd noticed that she was out nearly all the time these days. He guessed that she must've met some guy at work and decided that he was a better catch. Mickey didn't blame her. In any case, the Milkovich household was strangely emptier than usual, but not in a particularly bad way. With Terry gone and Svetlana out of the way, his brothers and sister had free reign of the house. Thankfully, none of his brothers had been involved in the heist (or least, they weren't at the _main_ scene of the crime), so they were, for the time being at least, still free men.

A couple of days after Svetlana left, Mickey invited Ian over. They'd just finished round two and were laying half dressed beneath the covers of Mickey's bed.

"This feels weird." Ian said softly, breaking the peaceful silence of the room.

"Why?" Mickey asked, passing the cigarette back to Ian and shifting his head a little where it was rested on the younger man's shoulder.

"We're right back where we started." Ian commented, taking a lazy drag.

Mickey rolled his eyes and smirked. "Yep." Mickey replied, thinking back to their first time, so many years ago now.

"Did you ever think we'd end up back here?" Ian asked, stubbing the spent cigarette out on the nearby ashtray.

"I don't know." Mickey mumbled, playing with the tie on the collar of Ian's hoodie absently. "I hoped so." He replied hesitantly. He'd spent so many nights in his bed in the past year and a half that Ian had been gone wishing that the redhead was there, with him, and that he didn't have to spend his nights curled up in a fucking sleeping bag. But he wasn't about to tell Ian that.

Ian smiled and rubbed the goose bumps on Mickey's abdomen with his thumb where his arm was wrapped around his waist loosely. "So did I." He whispered, his nose buried in Mickey's messy, gel-free hair. He smelt like deodorant and soap and smoke and kind of like Doritos too, and Ian didn't think there was a better smell. Mickey smiled and tried to hide the shiver that was most definitely caused by the fact that no one had paid the heating bill and it was now November.

They laid there for a while longer, lazily arguing about nothing in particular, smoking and occasionally kissing. Mickey was thinking about jumping the younger man for another round when Ian broke the peaceful bubble abruptly.

"_Shit,_ is that the time?" Ian said suddenly, looking at his watch and pulling away from the older man gently.

"What, you got a hair appointment?" Mickey asked in annoyance, shuffling on the bed in disgruntlement and watching Ian pull his jeans on.

"No," Ian laughed, grabbing his shirt from where it had landed over the lamp on the dresser, "I had to see an- uh, someone, about something." He explained vaguely, roughly pulling his shirt on over his head and grabbing his hoodie again.

Mickey furrowed his brow and felt around his pocket for his cigarettes. "Nothin' I need to know about?" He asked casually, trying to hide his concern.

"No." Ian said, shrugging his coat on. "Not yet, anyway." He added, and leaned over the bed to plant a deep kiss on the other man's mouth. "I'll see you later."

"Hn." Mickey grunted and watched him walk out of his bedroom.

A few hours later, Mickey was lazily flicking through a magazine behind the register of the Kash n' Grab when Ian arrived for his shift.

"Hey," he greeted with a smile. Mickey tried to quell the giddy feeling that had erupted in his stomach.

"What time d'you call this, Gallagher?" Mickey asked with a smirk. "You're twenty minutes late."

"I got caught up." Ian replied, untangling his scarf from his neck. "Has it been busy? He asked, walking behind the register and dumping his things behind the till.

"Of course it has," Mickey began, dropping the magazine down on the checkout, "apparently there's a snowstorm on its way so I guess that calls for a fuckin' stampede. We're out of most of the basics." He explained.

"Ah, I'll bring some more crates around." Ian said, and moved to walk to the back of the store.

"Hey." Mickey said, grabbing Ian by the collar of his shirt and yanking him down so he could smell him.

Ian frowned and gave Mickey a 'what gives?' kind of look. Mickey released him after a moment, and eyed him suspiciously. Ian looked confused and then shot the older man an accusatory look. "You think I _cheated_ on you!" He said, stunned.

"Not like I care if you do, shithead." Mickey mumbled into the magazine.

Ian rolled his eyes and crouched down beside him. "Mickey, I'm not cheating, okay? I just had an errand to run and I totally forgot about it." He explained quietly.

"Then what were you doing?" Mickey asked, trying to hide the slightly pained expression on his face.

"I was…" Ian began. Mickey raised an eyebrow. "Look, it's a surprise. I'll tell you about it when I'm ready."

Mickey looked at him suspiciously.

"Just trust me, okay?" Ian said, squeezing Mickey's shoulder and pulling away as the door opened.

Mickey nodded and watched Ian retreat into the store room.

"So when am I going to see this surprise?" Mickey asked an hour or so later as he started restocking the toilet paper.

Ian sighed and dumped the crate he was holding on the floor at the other end of the aisle. "I can show you tonight if you're that desperate." He said, and started unloading the crate onto the shelf.

Mickey smirked triumphantly. "It better not be some prissy gay shit." He said.

"It's not." Ian replied - though having said that, he had had a few ideas on how to make the surprise more romantic. But on second thought, that had been kind of a bad idea.

They carried on unloading the boxes just in time for what was apparently the second wave of customers looking to restock their homes in time for the snowstorm. By the time they'd closed and locked up the store, it was dark and the temperature had dropped even lower.

"So what's the surprise?" Mickey asked, hugging his coat a little more tightly around himself.

Ian rolled his eyes. "Hold on a minute." He said around the cigarette in his mouth as he pulled the metal covers down in front of the shop windows and locked them into place. When he was done, he turned around and blew out a trail of smoke.

Mickey took the cigarette from Ian's outstretched hand and took a deep drag on it. Ian pressed a hand to his back and pointed to the L, and they crossed the street and climbed the stairs just in time to catch the train just pulling into the station. The journey was punctuated with questions like 'is it at your place?', 'is it something I can open around other people?', 'Jesus, you didn't _actually_ wrap it did you?' and so on. In the end, Ian clamped a gloved hand to Mickey's mouth and told him to shut the fuck up and be patient.

Truth be told, Ian was nervous. He didn't really know how Mickey was going to take his surprise, to be honest. It was a bold move on his part, but he'd reasoned that it wasn't totally irreversible anyway, so if the whole thing was a disaster then at least he could forget the idea.

Eventually, they got off at their usual stop and began walking in the direction of Ian's house. But instead of taking the usual turn from the walkway under the L, they carried on walking and turned right at Shantytown to start walking down a street with a parade of closed stores. A few of them had bright neon signs still lit, and the lights bounced off of the murky, slushy puddles in the street and onto the steely store fronts. The snow had already started to fall again and the streetlamps caught the snowflakes in their flickering lights lazily. It was a short street in a quieter part of town and there weren't really any houses around. In fact, most of the buildings looked pretty old; there were even the initials A. S. in red brick over brown ones on the side of one building; advertising the name of a company that disappeared long ago.

"Is it drugs?" Mickey asked disdainfully, frowning. "Were you seeing a dealer?"

Ian sighed. "No, and stop trying to guess, you'll never get it." He said with a smirk, and slipped the cigarette from Mickey's lips to take a long drag before dropping it on the floor.

Mickey glared at him until they came to a store that said 'H. R. KRAUS DRUGS & PRESCRIPTIONS' in dim, neon red writing on a sign over the window. Ian walked up to a door between the pharmacy and the electronics store beside it and rummaged around his pocket for a moment before he drew out a key and stuck it in the lock. Mickey frowned but followed the other man inside, grateful for the change in temperature.

They were standing in a dark, narrow hallway and when Ian felt around the wall beside them for a light switch, the room lit up to reveal a steep, narrow staircase before them. Ian remained silent as he began to climb it, bypassing the door at the top and turning to climb up another flight of stairs until they apparently reached their destination.

Taking a deep breath, Ian once again pulled the keys from his pocket and unlocked the door in front of them. He stepped inside and walked into the middle of the main room.

"So what do you think?" Ian asked, feeling a little awkward.

Mickey stepped inside curiously and closed the door behind them carefully. "Huh." He said, and began walking around the room slowly. There was a main room which Mickey supposed was the living room. To his right there was a pair of large windows with mouldy net curtains that were letting in a small amount of light from the street lamps outside. The carpet looked as though it could use replacing; even in the semi-darkness, it was possible to see that there were several questionable stains here and there as well as a few chewed corners. A radiator sat between the two windows; it was an old, bulky thing that was covered in dust and on the far wall there was a fireplace, though it didn't look as though it had been used in a long time. To the left of the main entrance was the kitchen. It was a small room, separated from the living area completely – none of that modern, open-plan bullshit. The whole apartment was giving off a general seventies vibe – Mickey wouldn't have been surprised at all if that had been the last time the building had been redecorated. As he stepped forward, he noticed that it was a pass-through kitchen, and there was a single, broken chair leaning against the wall below it. He could just about make out a few cabinets when he glanced in through the gap in the wall.

Curiously, he turned his head left to glance down the short hallway and saw a pair of doors either side of the end of it, and walked towards them. Ian followed him slowly with a smirk on his face. Opening the door on his left, Mickey walked into what he guessed was the bedroom. There was another large window on the wall to his right, and when he walked into the room properly he could see the double-doors leading to the closet space beside the door. Again, the room looked like it hadn't been tidied up for a while and the un-lived –in smell was even stronger in this room. Ian stepped out of the way when Mickey tried to shuffle past him and go through the door opposite the bedroom. The bathroom was surprisingly big for such a small apartment. There was a bath on the opposite wall with a shower over it and a mouldy red curtain with a cobweb attached to it hung from a weak-looking brass rail. On his left there was a filthy sink with a broken mirror above it, covered in dust but illuminated by the dim light coming in through the large, patterned window. In the corner there was a toilet that also looked as though it was in dire need of cleaning.

Mickey turned around and found Ian leaning against the wall near the bedroom door. "Why'd you bring me here?" He asked, confused.

"Isn't it obvious?" Ian said, fiddling with the zip on his coat.

"Clearly not." Mickey replied, walking down the hall and back into the living room.

Ian was quiet for a moment, trying to think of what to say while Mickey traced the pattern on the mantelpiece.

"I, uh, brought you here to ask you something." He said quietly.

Mickey glanced over at him and wiped the dust he'd picked up from the mantelpiece on his jeans.

"I don't want you to freak out or anything," Ian began, "but I want you to know that you don't have to answer right away."

Mickey gave him a strange look. "What?"

"Do you want live here?" Ian asked. "I mean… with me?"

Mickey was quiet for a moment, but then he spoke. "Are you serious?" He asked, frowning.

"Yes." Ian replied.

"You're asking me to move in with you?"

"Yes."

"Seriously?"

"Yes!" Ian snapped, annoyed.

Mickey was silent for a few moments before a grin slowly spread across his face. Ian almost believed that it was a smile of joy, but he knew better.

"Ian," he laughed, "that's not going to work."

"Why?" Ian asked.

"Because… because it won't! You know it won't! I thought you would've known better than to expect something like that from me." Mickey spat, turning to look away.

Ian scowled at him. "That's not an answer." He said darkly, stepping forward.

Mickey huffed and shook his head, pacing over to the window. "We're not some old fuckin' married couple, alright? What, you think we're going to start shopping for kitchenware and flowery drapes just 'cause we made up?" He shouted, rummaging around his pockets for his cigarettes. "Get real, Firecrotch."

Ian shook his head and laughed bitterly. "You're so fucking pathetic, you know that?" He said venomously.

Mickey lit his cigarette and glared at him.

"You are," Ian continued, "because there's absolutely no reason for you not to say yes. Your dad's dead, your wife left and you know your brothers don't give a fuck about what you do. The only thing standing in the way of this is you and your own stupid fucking bullshit about us!" He shouted.

Mickey chewed his bottom lip and looked at the floor.

"And that's not even the saddest part!" Ian yelled. "The saddest part is, you want this. But you're too fuckin' scared of your dead dad to do anything about it."

Mickey's face had pinched into a scowl. "It's not that simple." He muttered, cutting in.

"What?"

"I said, it's not that simple." Mickey replied, looking up at the redhead.

"Why not?"

"You do remember where we live, right?" Mickey said, like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"Oh, come on, Mick- now you're just looking for excuses." Ian said, rolling his eyes.

"Am I?" Mickey asked, his voice a little bit quieter. "A few weeks ago some dude got jumped walking out of The Woodsman by a load of guys with hockey sticks and baseball bats. They had to cut a six inch piece of his skull out of his fuckin' head to reduce the swelling on his brain and he still ain't out of the hospital." He explained, pointing up at his own head.

The Woodsman was a bar a few streets away that catered to mostly middle aged and older bear types, but only a few people knew about it.

"You want us to end up like that?" He asked.

"Of course not." Ian said. "But it won't happen, alright?"

"How do you know?" Mickey shot back.

"Nobody but us is going to know that this is a one bedroom place, are they?" Ian explained. "For all anyone else knows, we're just roommates."

Mickey was silent, and Ian knew that he'd scored a point.

"Will you just give it a chance?" Ian asked softly, walking over to the other man slowly.

Mickey sighed and straightened up when Ian stood in front of him. "Fine." He said finally. "But no flowery drapes, alright?"

Ian beamed at him and nodded. "Promise."

Mickey nodded and took a deep drag on his cigarette. "So how exactly are we supposed to afford this place?" He asked after a few moments.

"Well, it's a pretty small place," Ian replied, "and it's also kind of a dump. But the landlady said we could have the first couple of months free if we redecorated. It's only four hundred and fifty bucks a month including water and electricity and I'll earn nearly twice that if I take on a few more hours at the store. We could split it down the middle."

Mickey shuffled and sighed sceptically. "Could you have chosen a better place?" He asked. "Somewhere that was built after the Great Depression maybe? This place is a total shithole. I feel like I'm going to die of Cholera if I live here."

Ian laughed. "The landlady did say something about there being some kind of epidemic that killed like thirty people in this building in the eighteen hundreds or some shit." He replied, and stepped forwards to wrap his hands around the older man's neck. "But," he added, "this place _is_ better than most of the apartments in this neck of the woods. Apparently she hasn't been able to rent this place out for a couple of years. Her last tenant put a shotgun in his mouth and nobody found him for like six months. She couldn't get rid of the smell." He explained airily.

"Great." Mickey sighed. "I ain't cleanin' up after you, just so you know. You can look after your own damn self." He mumbled. "And I ain't havin' some gay fucking house warming party either."

Ian smiled. "Alright." He said. "And I'm not picking up your dirty laundry."

"Deal." Mickey said, and leaned up to plant what was meant to just be a peck on the younger man's mouth.

Ian smiled happily and shoved his tongue into his mouth.


End file.
